The internet-of-things is growing at an ever increasing speed. Just like the internet put the world’s knowledge at everyone’s fingertips, the internet-of-things is doing the same in real-time and real-space. And the next piece of information to capture the attention of consumers is air quality.

Soon, everyone will have the opportunity to measure air quality at their desk and on-the-go thanks to Kickstarter and a firm called TZOA. As a one person risk management department, you may be thinking – “great, here comes more issues for me to deal with.” But what you should be thinking is “here’s a great tool to help me upgrade my IH program and provide the cleanest air to staff and students.”

All to often, we are reactive in our risk management and safety programs. One of the biggest areas is air quality and IH programs. We continue to fight the flu annually and as HR managers we are constantly looking for ways to make sure people take as few sick days as possible. Air quality is at the root of many of these issues.

TZOA has developed a consumer-level air quality monitor (as well as a research model) that can be worn on a person and provide real-time readings of the air quality. The little device captures particulate matter readings, temp, UV exposure, sunlight, humidity and pressure. Having information like this at our fingertips allows us to make good decisions about where to spend our time – hopefully in healthy environments.

Photo Courtesy of TZOA – smart phone readout

As risk managers, we should take the time to consider how a TZOA research model may help us provide better environments for our staff and students. In real-time (and at a low cost) we can monitor the air quality and make instant decisions about where to put our resources. We can also identify IAQ issues and trends before they become big problems. This is something that I spoke about in my talk on Big Data with Cal State University. We are all on budgets and have limited human resources available to us. Using the power of the internet-of-things and big data we can leverage our resources and time.

One thing is for certain, ignoring products like TZOA will be the nail in your career coffin. Employees will demand safety and good air quality is important to everyone.